Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #6637 in DVD
• Released on: 2001-07-02
• Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Dubbed, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English, Italian
• Dubbed in: Italian
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 85 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
In Scary Movie we visit BA Corpse High School, where all the pupils are visibly in their late 20s and a masked madman (or two) is on the loose, slaughtering self-involved, pop-culture-obsessed kids while trying to get to virginal heroine Cindy Campbell (Anna Faris). The gang are still guilt-ridden over their semi-accidental killing of a fisherman last Halloween, while at least one has been driven homicidally mad by the cancellation of the Wayans Brothers television show. An old vaudeville motto has it that you can't kid a kidder, and the makers of this would have done well to remember MAD Magazine didn't run a satire of Airplane!. The obvious flaw in the canny plan to satirise Wes Craven's Scream films is that they were already comedies, playing as many self-referential tricks as anything from the Naked Gun team but with the added bonus of actual scary scenes. The joke about ageing starlets pretending to be high school kids was done in Scream 3, for instance, and Scary Movie keeps sending up scenes that were funnier "straight" and only really gets a good satirical victim when it turns to the somewhat sillier I Know What You Did Last Summer franchise. Director Keenen Ivory Wayans and his writing-acting brothers Marlon and Shawn show no real interest in the genre they're taking pot-shots at, suggesting that the point here was to lampoon something hot rather than (as in the best spoofs) growing from a mixture of affection and contempt. The only way Scary Movie can get a reaction is going for gross: heads skewered by dildos, slashed-out breast implants, tiny dick gags, a torrential gush of sperm washing the heroine against the ceiling, relentless fag jokes (a DVD-ROM "Gaydar" feature even enumerates these) and a lot of old Cheech and Chong marijuana routines. About one in 10 of the jokes crack a grudging smile, with riffs on recognisable bits from The Matrix and The Usual Suspects, and a nicely nasty irrelevant aside that makes fun of both Titanic and Amistad. The best moment is a "scenes we've always wanted to see" scene in which an obnoxious cinemagoer is murdered by an entire audience for talking on her mobile phone during Shakespeare in Love. On the DVD: the DVD is letterboxed to 2.35:1 and has Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtracks in English and Italian, with subtitles in English and Italian. Extras are seven brief scenes cut out of the film (none very funny), a matey behind-the-scenes featurette, DVD-ROM features (a useful function plays the film with all the jokes and in-references explained in subtitles) and the theatrical trailer. --Kim Newman

From the studio
• Behind the Scenes Featurette

• Additional Scenes

'Hop-A-Long Shorty'

'Ray Calls a Play'

'Bobby’s Lesson'

'Gail Sets Surveillance Camera'

'Shorty Watches Girl on Surveillance Camera'

'Cindy’s Last Stand'

• Theatrical Trailer

• DVD ROM Features

Synopsis
In the tradition of such genre parodies as AIRPLANE!, THE NAKED GUN, and SPACEBALLS, Keenen Ivory Wayans takes on the teen horror flick with SCARY MOVIE, a campy, riotous send-up of everything from the SCREAM and HALLOWEEN franchises to I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER, CARRIE, and THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT. In a small town, a copycat is reenacting the SCREAM murders, and local reporter Gail Hailstorm will do just about anything to get the story. The six high school students who ran over a man on a sharp curve the year before think the killer is out for revenge, but sweet and innocent Cindy Campbell believes that the madman might just lurk a lot closer to home.
Cowritten by Shawn and Marlon Wayans (and four others), the script leaves no cliche unturned; in addition to the horror parodies, the film also spoofs such teen sex comedies as AMERICAN PIE and such hit films as THE SIXTH SENSE, THE MATRIX, and FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH. The film never lets up in its striking re-creations of classic scenes, and it never passes up the chance for a joke, no matter how crude. The young, attractive cast looks like it just jumped out of DAWSON'S CREEK, playing everything up to the hilt--and beyond.

Customer Reviews

Superb spoofing Scream
A group of teenagers are targeted by a serial killer exactly one year after they ran over a man.

In 1996 Scream was a film that reinstated the slasher horror genre and Keenan Ivory Wayans' spoof is a true and funny testament to that horror classic.

Modern spoofs often contain slapstick humour, stereotypes and a fairly predictable plot. This is evident with this 2000 hit and is pure silly entertainment that you can't help but love and laugh along with despite the conventional approach.

Recent releases such as Disaster Movie have brought the spoof genre to an all time low. Filled with unfunny parodies, attacks on celebrities and ultimately silly plots, it's a wonder why they are still being made.

In the nineties we had classic spoofs such as Austin Powers and Naked Gun, silly but with a sharp and entertaining plot.

Scary Movie has such a good plot, choosing to focus its energy on Scream and I know what you did last summer, that you forget its intentions to demean other films and therefore, are able to sit back and enjoy the ride.

The opening is pretty much Scream with some great moments of slapstick in, and crude slapstick at that with safety signs, sexual references and an out of control car.

This opening sets the tone for an engrossing comedy and viewers are thrust head first into typical teenagers lives, filled with some fine slapstick humour and stereotypes lives

There is a consistency to Scary Movie. There is little wondering away from its objective to tell the tale of the teens being targeted and therefore achieves a realism in its own context. With follow-ups 2, 3 and 4 there is a tendency to run away from the main narrative and have sillier skits that this original remains the most sophisticated to date.

Though the comedy is frequently predictable, there is still elegance about the way Wayans achieves this effect. His close and unflinching style gives that humorous and equally horrific substance to fly across both genres into this tantalizing tale.

Spoofs are always worth viewing for their sheer cheek to criticize blockbusters and Scary Movie is no exception with its pin point accuracy on Scream and other horrors. Filled with likeable slapstick and funny stereotypes, this is the finest in the series

8/10

the best of the 4 scary movies
This is the best of the 4 scary movies and it is laced throughout with good jokes and wacky characters and clever insights into the genuinely frightening films of recent years.Scary movie 4 has better special effects but this, the original scary movie,shows how much better a film can be with a good script overwhelming the special effects.

Frightfuly funny
Ok I think this one is the best out of the four. I have orderd it but it will not come because of the postal strike atm. Funny, Dirty and all the micky takes trown in. Mainly takes the mick of Scream a horror which has a person in a hooded cloak and mask going around killing people although I have never seen Scream this is what it is like.